Frederick Ato Armah

Since August 2019, Frederick Ato Armah has been a Professor of Environmental and Sustainability Science at the University of Cape Coast (UCC). He was the Director of the Directorate of Research Innovation and Consultancy (DRIC), UCC from April 2019 to July 2022. Prof Armah is an interdisciplinary scientist with interest in the natural and human dimensions of environment and health. His professional expertise include multivariate environmental statistics; global environmental change mitigation and adaptation; environmental and natural resource management, remediation and policy; human health risk assessment; climate change-human health nexus; pollution of environmental media and biota; and socio-ecological systems. He has extensive experience in teaching, research and collaboration with partners in both developed (Canada, Sweden, Netherlands, USA) and developing countries (Ethiopia, Cameroon, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Cambodia, Tanzania). He has served as consultant to several organisations and government agencies both local and international. He holds a BSc (Hons) Degree in Chemistry from the University of Cape Coast in Ghana and MSc Degree in Environmental Studies and Sustainability Science from Lund University in Sweden. Prof Armah has a PhD in Geography (Environment and Human Health) from the University of Western Ontario in Canada. In addition, he holds a Certificate in Building African Entrepreneurship Universities in the Context of Responsible Innovations and Sustainable Development (AFRIDEP/UNECA); Certificate in Transforming Leadership and Governance (ILF); Certificate in Project Planning and Proposal Development (AAU); Certificate in University Leadership and Management Development (AAU), Certificate in Preliminary Assessment & Site Inspection of Surface water, Groundwater, Air & Soil (USEPA); and Certificate in Facilitating Multi-stakeholder Process and Social Learning: Advanced Course in the Use of Participatory Approaches for Institutional Change (WUR). He was awarded as an Outstanding Researcher at the University of Cape Coast for hard work, dexterity, and great dedication to research during the 2015/2016 academic year. Prof Armah has worked at all levels of the educational ladder (basic, secondary, tertiary) in Ghana starting from 1995. Cumulatively, he has garnered over 20 years of teaching and research experience more than half of which is at the tertiary level. As Deputy Director of DRIC from August 2016 to April 2019, Prof Armah led the development of the first UCC Intellectual Property Policy (IPP) and co-chaired the committee that crafted the first ever UCC Research Report, which has since received extensive critical acclaim. He also chaired the committee that developed the 2018-2022 UCC Research Agenda, which gives expression to the research tenets and trajectory of UCC as set out in the 2018-2022 Corporate Strategic Plan. As Deputy Director of DRIC, Prof Armah also successfully led UCC to apply for the Queen Elizabeth II (QES II) Advanced-Scholars program, which seeks to establish research capacity and leadership qualities in young African and Canadian scholars in order to enable them to competently address global challenges pertaining to Environment, Food and Health. Prof Armah is the UCC team lead on the 2.5 million dollar partnership grant titled Appraising Risk, Past and Present: Interrogating Historical Data to Enhance Understanding of Environmental Crises in the Indian Ocean World. This 7-year initiative seeks to enhance historical understanding of the factors at work in past environmental crises, and thereby significantly improve currently employed environmental risk perception and governance (ERPG) tools. The team consists of 8 Co-Applicants, 17 Partner Institutions, and 23 additional Collaborators (including UCC) spread across 17 countries in Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, and North America. He is also co-applicant and the team lead for Ghana on the 2.5 million dollar Vulnerability to Viability (V2V): Global Partnership for Building Strong Small-Scale Fisheries Communities research grant. Prof. Armah is the country lead for the 2-million-dollar project-Farmer Organization, Mobilization and Political Opportunities (‘FOMPO’), which is sponsored by the Swedish Research Council (FORMAS) and Lund University, Sweden (2020-2024). In February 2020, Prof Armah was nominated to serve as a nexus assessment scoping expert on the Intergovernmental Science Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). He has published more than 160 peer-reviewed scientific articles in reputable international journals. In 2020, Prof. Armah won the Association of American Publishers Awards for Professional and Scholarly Excellence (PROSE) in Environmental Sciences, together with co-authors on the Sixth Edition of the UN Global Environment Outlook Report. This award recognises the very best in professional and scholarly publishing in scientific research.